


Alternative Ending

by moroiulmeu



Series: Amadeus: Lost Scenes Series [2]
Category: Amadeus (1984)
Genre: M/M, Maybe it's just me, There had to be one somewhere because there wasn't in life or the film, This doesn't feel as smooth to me as the first part, a happy ending., so have some fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-07
Updated: 2019-09-07
Packaged: 2020-10-11 13:22:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20546843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moroiulmeu/pseuds/moroiulmeu
Summary: Salieri has decided he's had enough of this nonsense, he's taking Mozart home.





	Alternative Ending

**Author's Note:**

> This doesn't feel as smooth to me as the first part. I may rewrite it, but what does everyone think? It feels like it's missing something, and frankly it was a bit rushed. There are several ways this whole thing could go. I've thought of a few of them and I'm willing to try my hand again. Also, if anyone could advise me on the formatting I would be much obliged. I want a clean read but also normal breaks. Normal formatting would be nice. I don't know if one can do that.

A cold wind swept through the apartment causing Salieri to shiver. He had removed his coat to avoid getting it covered in ink, which his hands now where, but he wished he hadn't, he was half frozen in this place. He shot an upward glance at Mozart, who wasn't noticing much beyond his own dictation and absent conducting.  
"That's enough," said Salieri quietly, looking at the shine caused by the dampness of Mozart's skin.  
"What's enough? If you're referring to that last measure-"  
"No. I mean all of this," Salieri replied, holding his hands out and gesturing.  
He rose abruptly, causing Mozart to lurch forward in fear.  
"Salieri, wait!" He cried, "I can't finish this without you!"  
The words sounds strange in his ears, Mozart's terror echoing around inside his rib cage, tearing at heart. Months ago he would have given anything to hear that admittance... And now?  
Salieri gathered up the sheet music.  
"We will finish it another time, Wolfgang. Right now I'm getting you out of here. You are coming with me where you will be kept warm and fed and you will receive the medical care you so urgently require."  
Wolfgang shook his head in despair.  
"I won't survive the night," He laughed weakly.  
"If I don't get you out of this place, of that, I have no doubt."  
Salieri gently pulled the covers back and Mozart grabbed his wrist again, starring at him in desperation.  
"Salieri... Antonio, I'm begging you..."  
Salieri shook his head and draped his coat over Mozart's small shivering body. He grabbed the only throw blanket he had spotted in the place and wrapped it around that.  
"We will finish your requiem, I promise you, together. But not here," he assured Mozart, taking his face in his hands for a moment.  
He winced at the scalding fever he could feel under his touch and he found himself brushing Mozart's sopping hair back. He pulled the blanket up over Mozart's head.  
"Do you have a folder I can put the requiem in?"  
"In the cabinet," Mozart replied dully.  
Salieri found what he was looking for and once secure in the folder he handed the requiem to Mozart.  
"Here. Hold on to this. Keep it close and dry."  
"Why can't you-"  
Mozart found himself being picked up yet again that night and carried out of his room and down the stairs. His teeth clacked together unpleasantly as they stepped outside. He barely registered that the snow was still falling in the deceptively peaceful night.  
Salieri managed to flag a cab and set his charge inside before climbing in after him.  
"Salieri, this really isn't getting anything done," Mozart complained as Salieri pulled him closer, silently offering what little body heat his own shivering form possessed.  
"If it saves your life it hardly matters."  
"But the figure-"  
"Enough!" Salieri barked, surprising himself, before he finished in barely a whisper, "I will deal with your figure."  
Mozart fell quiet, one of his hands grabbing Salieri's.  
Salieri found himself wracking his brain. Surely it couldn't be too difficult to determine what the Baron had slipped Mozart to cause his condition, could it?  
He found himself praying to the God he had been so angry with, silently begging for the life of the little man in his arms.

He could hear the crackle of a fireplace closeby and he was dimly aware that for the first time in weeks he felt somewhat warm. There were mountains of blankets piled ontop of him. No wind howled through this house. No snow melted through the windows or dripped through the ceiling.  
Mozart sighed in contentment, feeling like he could spend the rest of his life in this spot.  
A nagging feeling attempted to remind him he had something to do. Something to finish. What was it?  
Something to do with life.  
No.  
That wasn't right.  
Something to do with death?  
The requiem.  
Mozart struggled to sit up and succeeded in making the covers fall back enough to spot a tall dark figure seated nearby in an armchair by the fire.  
For a moment Mozart's heart skipped, thinking his unearthly patron had seized him in the night, but as he realized it was Salieri with his hands wrapped around a mug and looking deep in worried thought, he relaxed.  
"This bed is amazing. Is this yours?" Mozart tried, "It smells like you... I mean, not to sound weird or anything... I haven't been sniffing you."  
Salieri's head jerked up so fast his neck hurt.  
"Wolfgang..." He breathed, before nodding, "It is mine, yes... How are you feeling?"  
"Warmer... Hungry," Mozart admitted.  
Salieri rose from the armchair with a small, tired smile.  
"I will find you something."  
"Grazie."

It wasn't long and Salieri returned with a bowl of warm soup which he got Mozart to drink part of before Mozart stopped, a peculiar expression on his face.  
"Damn..." Salieri muttered.  
He had figured this would happen, he had feared it, and he hadn't been wrong to. He managed to set an empty bowl down just in time for Mozart to lose his dinner in.  
Salieri sighed, brushing Mozart's hair back again.  
"Easy... Take it easy..."  
"It hurts..."  
"I know... Hold on, I will get you something else."  
"I've rather lost my appetite, signore."  
Salieri shook his head.  
"No, not food. Something for the nausea. Just rest."  
Mozart dropped back on the bed like a lifeless doll and Salieri found himself almost fleeing the room.  
"There has to be something..." He mused outloud, running through all the remedies he had learned for different things in his youth, "Damn it all... I'll try all of them then. Where is that doctor?"  
He had sent for a doctor the second he had passed through his doors, and that had been hours ago.  
Salieri grabbed everything he could think of that could possibly work, mixing up different liquids in desperation and still pleading with God, bargaining, offering everything.  
He returned to his room to find Mozart mostly asleep. He shook his shoulder gently.  
"Wolfgang, drink this..."  
"What is it?" Mozart asked blurrily.  
"Something that will help you feel better."  
God, he wished that was true. He hoped that was true.  
Mozart drank and made a funny face.  
"It tastes awful."  
Salieri almost smiled in spite of himself.  
"Medicine always does. One more and then you may sleep."

Salieri paced the bedroom almost frantically, alternating between having his hands clasped behind his back and wringing them infront of himself.  
"Think Antonio, think..."  
He glanced at Mozart who slept fitfully, his breathing shallow.  
There came a knock on the door and he practically ripped it off of its hinges in response. A startled servant gawked at him in surprise.  
"S.. Signore, the doctor," The servant stammered, having never seen his master anything but calm.  
"Send him in at once you fool!"  
Salieri was shocked to find himself half shrieking.  
The second the doctor hit the door Salieri grabbed him and pulled him inside before pointing at Mozart.  
"Fix this at once, sir! I implore you!"  
Salieri found himself begging in his native Italian.  
The doctor looked alarmed but set to work examining Mozart as Salieri slumped against the wall, feeling his heart crumple inside itself even further.  
"Signore, if he lives it will be because of you," The doctor informed him gravely.  
Salieri sank to the floor, burying his face in his hands.

The sunlight tickled his face causing him to screw it up in discomfort. Resigned to waking he sat up and realized where he was. Lying on the floor of his own bedroom.  
Across from him Mozart slept soundly in his bed, a faint bit of color having returned to his sallow complexion. The doctor slept in the chair.  
The sight caused his trampled heart to flutter with hope and he quietly crept to the bed, watching Mozart breathe. It was clear, without struggle. He put a hand over his own chest in relief.  
There was a soft knock on the door and Salieri opened it much more gently this time.  
"Keep your voice down," he instructed.  
"Sir, Frau Mozart is in the foyer."  
Salieri nodded, "I'm coming, thank you."  
He slipped out into the hall and shut the door as quietly as he could before heading downstairs.  


"Signor Salieri, where is my husband?" Constanze inquired earnestly, clutching the hand of young Karl.  
Salieri put his hands together awkwardly before twisting them helplessly.  
"Your husband fell very ill, Frau Mozart... The apartment in which he was housed was not the proper place for a recovery. He is sleeping now. I would like to offer both my services and spare quarters until such time he is well enough to look for someplace else."  
Constanze stood rooted to the spot, her face dead white and jaw dropped in shock.  
"But... But he will be alright, right?"  
Salieri held out his hands, offering her the silent truth. He did not know, he could only continue his silent, fervent prayers.  
Constanze hugged Karl to her.  
"My servant will show you to your rooms, please do not hesitate to ask for anything you need," Salieri finished, bowing.

"Wait, hold on, go back," Mozart said, scratching his head and frowning to himself.  
He was sitting up in Salieri's bed, his fever much lower than before. He had been eating and drinking properly, his full recovery was something to be expected.  
"To which part?" Salieri asked.  
"The Masons... How petty are they?"  
Salieri smiled smally.  
"That's what you're getting out of this?" He asked.  
"I understand your position," Mozart replied, "How did you stand a chance? I'm hopeless. I'm kidding, by the way, that's just a joke, but the Masons... The Lodge... They did this over an opera that maybe twelve people saw?"  
Salieri found himself laughing, he wasn't sure why but the entire idea seemed completely ludicrous to him.  
"'Twelve people?' Dear God, Mozart... You really were out of it..."  
"You mean there were more than twelve people?" Mozart asked, starring at him comically in surprise.  
"God, yes... Next opera I would advise you use your eyes."  
Mozart snorted and looked away in a mock huff.  
"Are we going to finish that requiem or what?"  
Salieri froze.  
"You still want me to help you finish it?" He asked in a hushed tone.  
"Well, everyone has made it abundantly clear I'm not leaving this bed anytime soon, which, sorry, by the way, though it's partly your own damn fault."  
"Dear God... Yes, of course... Hold on"  
Salieri stood and located the folder with the requiem before sitting down again.  
"Now, where did we leave off?" Mozart asked.  
"Right in the middle of-"  
"Oh, right..." Mozart said, leaning forward and kissing his host square on the mouth.  
Salieri stopped everything, he was quite sure he even stopped breathing as Mozart's hand enclosed around his wrist, causing him to drop the sheet music. He closed his eyes, the song in his mind far different from any he had ever written. Mozart lingered for a moment before letting go.  
"Damn, I've been waiting to do that..." Mozart admitted, "That was even better than I thought it would be."  
Salieri sat there in pleasant stupefaction, unable to stop the lazy, satisfied smile that crossed his face. He frowned suddenly at a thought.  
"Wolfgang, your wife, Constanze-"  
Mozart laughed.  
"Really, Antonio, you're so naive... It's cute, really."  
His face burned with embarrassment.  
"What do you mean?"  
"Oh for Heaven's sake, I'm sure Nannerl keeps her occupied quite enough."  
Salieri let out something like a wheeze before coughing.  
"Oh my God..."

The crowd was roaring before anyone ever set foot on the stage, such was the reaction of the combined efforts of Mozart and Salieri, for one night only, a joint opera. The house packed to the rafters, the Emperor seated amongst them and full of pride for his Court Composer and musicians. It was an audience that knew well what kind of show it could expect...  
It was an audience entirely ignorant of what was going on in a small room backstage.  
"We're going to be late," Salieri said, more amused than anything as he watched Mozart struggle with his belongings.  
"And who's fault is that?" Mozart asked acidly.  
Salieri held out his hands.  
"Moi? You have the wrong man. I am a respectable, dignified subject of the Hapsburg court."  
"Respectable my ass!" Mozart retorted, "Here, hold this!"  
He shoved his folder into Salieri's arms.  
Salieri laughed as Mozart finished straightening himself.  
"There. Presentable?"  
"As presentable as you're ever getting, Lupo," Salieri replied affectionately, offering him his folder with a kiss on the cheek.  
"My father always warned me Italians were trouble. He was right."  
Salieri smirked and gestured towards the door, "They'll be pulling the curtains in a moment. After you."


End file.
